Examples using SQS

funcs.py

import uuid
import time
import boto
import json
from boto.sqs.message import RawMessage

AWSKey = "{redacted}"
AWSSecret = "{redacted}"
testQueue = "testqueue"

# Pushes a message onto the queue
def addMessageToQueue(message):
    # Data required by the API
    data = {
        'submitdate': time.strftime("%Y-%m-%dT%H:%M:%S", time.gmtime()),
        'key': str(uuid.uuid1()),
        'message': str(message)
    }

    # Connect to SQS and open the queue
    sqs = boto.connect_sqs(AWSKey, AWSSecret)
    q = sqs.create_queue(testQueue)

    # Put the message in the queue
    m = RawMessage()
    m.set_body(json.dumps(data))
    status = q.write(m)


# Polls the queue for messages
def readMessageFromQueue():
    # Open the queue
    sqs = boto.connect_sqs(AWSKey, AWSSecret)
    q = sqs.create_queue(testQueue)
    q.set_message_class(RawMessage)

    # Get all the messages in the queue
    results = q.get_messages()
    ret = "Got %s result(s) this time.\n\n" % len(results)

    for result in results:
        msg = json.loads(result.get_body())
        ret += "Message: %s\n" % msg['message']
    
    ret += "\n... done."
    return ret

index.html

<form action="sendMessage" method="POST">
    <p>Enter your message here:
    <textarea name="message"></textarea></p>
    <p><input type="submit" value="Send message" /></p>
</form>

<p><a href="readMessage">Wait for a message in the queue</a></p>

index.py

import funcs
from Cheetah.Template import Template
 
def index(req):
    t = Template(file='/var/www/html/examples/sqs/index.html')
    req.content_type = 'text/html'
    return t.__str__()

def sendMessage(req):
    message = req.form.getfirst('message')
    funcs.addMessageToQueue(message)
    return "Done."

def readMessage(req):
    return funcs.readMessageFromQueue()

From the SQS Boto docs for create_queue():

Calling this method on an existing queue name will not return an error from SQS unless the value for visibility_timeout is different than the value of the existing queue of that name. This is still an expensive operation, though, and not the preferred way to check for the existence of a queue. See the boto.sqs.connection.SQSConnection.lookup() method.

So I think the answer is yes, gangtao: get_queue() or lookup() would be better. A little more code would likely be necessary, but the results would still be better.